


Rain

by naboru



Category: Transformers Generation One
Genre: Gen, Implied Relationships, Slice of Life
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-06-07
Updated: 2015-06-07
Packaged: 2018-04-03 08:25:51
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,349
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4093963
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/naboru/pseuds/naboru
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Onslaught visits Blast Off for business and is stuck when it starts raining.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Rain

**Author's Note:**

> **Continuity:** G1 (part of the [Dysfunction AU](http://community.livejournal.com/lost_carcosa/19574.html#cutid1)), pre-war  
>  **Characters:** Onslaught, Blast Off, cameo of an unnamed OC (Jet-Lag)  
>  **Rating:** PG  
>  **Disclaimer:** Sadly, nothing is mine.  
>  **Beta:** ltharkitty

Onslaught walked along the corridor, glancing at the apartment numbers as he passed the doors.

He’d used the wrong elevator again. He could never remember which was closest to Blast Off’s apartment. But he wasn’t there often, and he wasn’t in that much of a hurry either.

Onslaught’s steps were quiet on the alien surface, a material foreign to Cybertron and most certainly imported.

It was posh, just like the whole building, like the entire housing block. If Onslaught hadn’t known he was still in Kaon, he’d have thought he was in Iacon or maybe Praxus.

Or maybe in Altihex, but he had no experiences of the housing there. He doubted many who weren’t native to Altihex had. The city state was as aloof as its inhabitants, and he had to grin when he thought of Blast Off.

Eventually, he reached the door, the shuttle's name written next to the button. Deep in thought, he pushed it, and pinged the shuttle at the same time.

"Heh", someone uttered. A mech had come out of a door a bit further down the hallway. "Good luck. The shuttle just came back a few joors ago." He flashed Onslaught a grin.

A visor hid the optics, but it was a familiar glint that Onslaught knew from Vortex. Rotor blades on shoulder mounts flicked, and wings on lower legs and upper arms moved. A triple changer heli-jet, Onslaught thought, built here in Kaon in small numbers.

"I know," Onslaught said. "But why are you interested in his schedule?"

The mech came closer with a shrug. "I take care of his weird organic tank when he's gone, but he changed his code already." He passed Onslaught. "If you wanna break in like his heli-friend, feel free. I'm gone now." And that he was. With a lazy wave of his hand, he rounded a corner to the nearest elevator and was out of sight.

Onslaught huffed, amused and slightly surprised. He hadn't known Blast Off had actual contact to his neighbours. Let alone that he let them in to look after his apartment when he was gone.

Shaking his head minutely, Onslaught rang again and sent another ping. Blast Off was deep in recharge. Not that Onslaught knew it exactly, but he'd been away in space for over a quartex. The shuttle always slept for cycles after such a trip.

Onslaught had never bothered to ask why. It was impolite to question Blast Off's work in space, and he also wasn't fond of how condescendingly the shuttle would react to such a query.

A sigh left Onslaught's vents, and he rang again, twice, and then again after a few astroseconds. He really hoped Blast Off would wake up soon. He needed this information by tomorrow.

As if someone had heard him think, the light over the button changed from red to green, and the door slid aside.

"For frag's sake." Blast Off's growl could be heard before the door was completely opened. "You stupid imbecile, you kno- oh," Blast Off stopped mid-sentence. It made Onslaught grin. "I thought you're Vortex," the shuttle explained. 

Onslaught nodded. "I guessed. Don't worry. He's on a mission in Vos. He won't be back until the day after tomorrow."

"Thank frag," Blast Off muttered, and raised his arm, leaning against the door frame with his forehead resting on his hand. He glanced down at Onslaught. "Why are you here? I'm off work and I handed all the papers in. There shouldn't be a problem with the cargo."

He sounded tired, but Onslaught had expected that. "It's not about the current load. I need an opinion about a quotation. They suggest a delivery route, but I've long since learnt that you're the expert on space flight. I need you to look at it." Complimenting the other would hopefully help make Blast Off cooperate. It wasn't that Onslaught doubted he would, but he knew the shuttle's moods after being woken up.

Blast Off just nodded. Maybe he was too tired to be thoroughly annoyed. "Come in." He pushed himself off the frame, and made room for Onslaught to step inside.

The apartment was as posh as one would suggest from the outside. When Onslaught had been there the first time, he'd only been surprised that it wasn't bigger. It was only two rooms plus a storage room and the washracks. He'd never asked Blast Off why he'd chosen this one, but it was possible even he didn't know.

Onslaught made a mental note to ask Vortex about Blast Off’s apartment. The 'copter might have found out.

"Take a seat," Blast Off pointed at the couch and the armchairs near the huge panorama window. "High grade?"

Onslaught gave another nod. "If you don't mind"

Blast Off huffed, the tiniest twitch of his lips to a grin visible for only an astrosecond. "Otherwise I wouldn't have asked."

When Blast Off went to his storage, Onslaught sat down on the arm chair. He had a good view over his city from here. It was dusty, but the lights of the buildings shone through like stars. He understood why Blast Off lived on the second highest floor.

"What kind of quotation is it?" Blast Off asked, dragging Onslaught's attention back to the issue of why he was there in the first place. The shuttle put two cubes on the table, and sat on the couch close to Onslaught.

"Swindle sent it today and demanded an answer right away. I told him I need longer than a few kliks, but his sub-contractor needs the information by tomorrow. It's for the ore Brawl needs for his explosives research." Onslaught took out a datapad, and handed it to Blast Off. 

"Brawl's research... No matter how often you say it, it always sounds wrong." Blast Off's intakes vented air in what could have been a soft laugh. He activated the pad, and took his cube.

"I know what you mean, but Brawl is good at what he does."

Blast Off shrugged. "I know. It's still a paradox that he can hardly follow the simplest of orders while he knows how chemicals react with each other on an atomic level."

That made Onslaught utter a dry laugh. He allowed himself a small smirk, and cracked his cube of high grade open. Sipping slowly - it was above average high grade - Onslaught let his thoughts drift again while Blast Off read the datapad.

The shuttle's optics were dim, and if Onslaught hadn't known Blast Off long enough to take his job seriously like he did, he would have thought the shuttle would be back in recharge any moment.

After a klik or two, Blast Off groaned, and rubbed his face. "Frag."

"What's wrong?"

"The route they suggest," Blast Off muttered and stood up again. Onslaught let him. He'd explain it soon enough.

Going back to the storage room, Blast Off came back with a small device. "I deleted the maps of this area of space just a few orns ago."

"I see." Onslaught sipped. He'd learnt that shuttles didn't always have all the maps saved in their hard drives. It was an odd thought for him as a planet-bound to delete essential things like this, but maps of star systems needed more space then maps of areas on Cybertron. And it wasn’t like Onslaught had kept every map of a foreign planet he'd ever been deployed to.

Blast Off activated the device, and Onslaught offlined his optics for a moment. Those 3D-star projectors made him feel motion sick when they booted and the holograms were set up.

When Onslaught activated his optical sensors again, Blast Off was already tinkering with the map. He zoomed in on a certain spot, looked at the datapad, and looked back at the map. He frowned, changed the map and rubbed his temple with two fingers. It was interesting to watch as the shuttle's expression was more telling than usual.

Onslaught waited patiently, he wasn't in a hurry. It was almost midnight by now, and only the dimming of the lights outside gave a hint to the time. Sometimes he missed Cybertron's star, and the warmth it gave during the daytime. He wondered how it was for Blast Off and Altihex when all the efforts to save the star had failed and Cybertron became dark.

Outside, the lights began flickering, distorted in a familiar way when it started to rain. Drops gathered on the window and flowed down, building ever changing mosaics of diffracted light.

Blast Off looked up at the sound. "It's raining," he said, his exhaustion present in his tone.

"Maybe it'll have stopped by the time you're done."

Blast Off offlined the projector. "I am now." He gave Onslaught the datapad back. "If you like, you can wait here until it stops."

"I'd appreciate that." Onslaught could also call a transport, but getting one soon when rain hadn't been forecast could take a while. "What do you think about the quotation?"

"It's good." Blast Off leant against the backrest. "The route is fine. There's a shorter one, but I wouldn't suggest that to insentient vessels. It's a radiation thing." He shrugged and drank from his high grade. "The cargo insurance is also okay, but you should ask Swindle if he's trying to make a few more creds with it." The shuttle's vents puffed air in a soft laugh, and Onslaught understood.

He shook his head, then sighed in fake annoyance. "I will do that then."

Blast Off’s head twitched in what was a nod.

Silence settled between them in which they only sipped from their cubes, and listened to the rain.

It was a nice sound, calming, an even rhythm and nice display of the force of nature.

“It makes you think, doesn’t it?” Blast Off said out of the blue, thoughtful or tired, Onslaught couldn’t tell.

“What do you mean?” Onslaught looked at the shuttle staring outside.

“Rain,” Blast Off answered shortly, but continued a moment before Onslaught could ask. “On most worlds I’ve been it’s a life-giver. But here, it corrodes everything it touches.”

Blast Off took a sip, slowly. Onslaught didn’t interrupt or spoke up. Getting an insight into Blast Off’s thoughts was always interesting. It wasn’t worth wasting the opportunity with impatience.

“It sets our world apart. It’s one of the many things that are different here than on other worlds.” Blast Off slid down the backrest a little, and set a foot on the edge of the table. “It’s… unnatural. Isn’t it?” He looked at Onslaught with a blank expression. “It makes you think how natural we are.”

It made Onslaught frown. Cybertron’s nature was just different from other planets. He’d seen lots of worlds whose ‘nature’ had always been different.

“Every robotic race I’ve encountered,” Blast Off began anew, optics again focusing on the large window. “Never developed of its own. They either reached this stage of evolution by constantly modifying themselves, or they fought or outlived their makers.”

Onslaught tensed at the words.

The Cybertronian race had done all three things.

Sometimes insights into Blast Off’s thoughts brought up unnerving truths. This wasn’t how Onslaught had expected to end the day.

“I don’t even know if there are recordings of the nature of rain from when the Quintessons were here.”

“What would you want to find out reading them? If they even exist.” Onslaught emptied his cube. The taste of high grade lingering on his glossa even when it was gone, and the potency of it made him tired.

Blast Off shrugged. “Just wondering if the rain was acid back then already.”

Onslaught wasn’t sure he wanted to know the connection Blast Off drew with acid rain and their half-organic makers. He decided to stay quiet for the time, and would let the shuttle continue if he wished.

But Blast Off didn’t.

When Onslaught glanced back at the other, the shuttle’s posture was slumped. The empty cube was loose in the large hand and his optics were dark.

Onslaught puffed air from his vents in an amused huff. If the shuttle stayed like this for the rest of his recharge cycle, he’d ache all over. And Onslaught would be responsible for it in some way.

Putting his cube on the table, he stood up. Onslaught pondered a moment as he looked down at the sleeping mech, and then sighed.

Blast Off was heavy. He lifted one of the shuttle’s arms over his shoulder and dragged him up.

Manoeuvring the limp frame to the bedroom was a challenge and resulted in a knocked-over lamp and Blast Off’s shoulder bumping hard against the door frame. Once Onslaught managed to put Blast Off on the berth, he was both surprised that he was still in recharge, and relieved that the lamp wasn’t broken.

Venting deeply, Onslaught sat down on the edge of the berth. The room was dark aside from the two lights at the tank in the corner of the room - Blast Off’s hermetically sealed biosphere that Vortex had told him about. It stood near another window against which the rain pounded.

It didn’t look like it was going to stop any time soon.

Behind him, Blast Off’s intakes stuttered, and ailerons clicked against his legs.

It would be a long day tomorrow. Onslaught would have to meet with the city Councillor to discuss further funding of the weapons development programme. To stay awake until it stopped raining wasn’t wise.

Onslaught got up a last time to turn off the lights in the living room, and then settled down next to Blast Off.

It was an odd situation since Blast Off always seemed to avoid recharging next to Onslaught. As though he tried to maintain a certain distance from him even though they interfaced now and then. Onslaught asked himself if it would have been different if he wasn't Blast Off’s employer.

It didn’t really matter, he decided, and his last action was sending a transit request for tomorrow morning.

Next to Onslaught, Blast Off moved, but he was already powering down and didn’t notice the arm slung around him.


End file.
